FROM YOUR PASTOR’S DESK:
POLITICS AND RELIGION: A MATCH MADE BY SATAN
Benjamin Franklin, sage of the Continental Congress, expressed this as his conviction:
“When religion is good, it will take care of itself; when it is not able to take care of itself, and God does not see fit to take care of it, so that it has to appeal to the civil power for support, it is evidence to my mind that it’s cause is a bad one.”- Letter to Dr. Price.
Writing of the election of bishops, the historical Schaff declares that:
“Many are elected in account of BADNESS, to prevent the mischief they would OTHERWISE do.’ – ‘History of the Christian Church,’ Vol. III, Sec. 49, par. 2, note 6, p. 240.
“Even the sanctity of the church was not respected by the fighting parties. The historian Milman, speaking of the installation of a bishop at Constantinople says,——-‘In the morning, Philip [the prefect of the East] appeared in his car, with Macedonius in his side with the pontifical attire; he drove directly to the church, but the soldiers were obliged to HEW [cut] their way through the dense and resisting CROWD to the altar. Macedonius passed over the DEAD bodies (three thousand are said to have fallen) to the throne of Christian prelate.’- ‘History of Christianity,’ Vol. XI, p. 426. NY. 1870. Socrates (‘Ecclesiastical History,’ Bk. II, chap. 17, p. 96) gives the number slain as 3150.
“Can we wonder at the lack of spiritual insight and sound judgment of such bishops when they met at their Councils to formulate the CREED OF CHRISTENDOM? They decreed in favor of image worship, purgatory, prayers for the dead, veneration of relics, and many other HEATHEN customs, PERSECUTING all who would not fall in line with their MONGREL customs. At the Council of Laodicea, A. D. 304, they anathemized Sabbath-keepers in the following way:
“Christians must not JUDAIZE by resting on the Sabbath, but must work on that day, rather honoring the Lord’s Day [Sunday]; and if they can, resting then as CHRISTIANS. But if any should be found to judaizers [keeping the seventh-day Sabbath], then let them ANATHEMA from Christ.’ – ‘Canon XXIX, ‘Index Canonum,’ John Fulton, D.D., LL.D., p. 259.” (From Facts of Faith, C. Edwardson, pp. 115, 116.
Be a blessing not a burden, to someone today, only by God’s grace, NMF.